Gaïa — Restaurant in Toulouse

The place is really nice and we thought it was going to live up to the façade and the friendly service, but unfortunately the food was well below parr and the bill well above ... A starter that sounded so good - a torched mackerel - it wasn't torched, but rather overcooked, much like you might find in a tin and no taste of torching - which was a bit of a let down. A steak Rossini ordered rare arrived very well done, so I sent it back, the foie gras was full of nerves too. By the time my steak arrived back as a rare to bleu version of the original one the foie gras poêlée was cold and my wife had nearly finished her sole - which tasted like it was overcooked by the texture and almost like it had spent some time in the freezer beforehand. The chocolate dessert was nice, my pavlova was average, but the coffee was nice. The service was generally good and the wine by the glass was also good for both of us. Apéritif with no nibbles seemed a bit stingy though for a restaurant de standing. I don't like leaving negative comments, but we were really underwhelmed by this retaurant, apart from the front of house staff. A strange thing is that the retaurant shares a glass wall with a médiatheque / library, which was bizarre and the toilets appear to be shared with offices in the same block...

Not bad, not good. Probably overhyped.

Starting with them having as a booking slot 14:30, but as you get there you’re told you only have 10 minutes to order as the kitchen will be closing. Why would you offer a 14:30 booking then?

Food wasn’t bad, but nothing special. Lacked a bit of season.

The restaurant is beautifully decorated and the open kitchen looks super cool. However, if you seat in the tables in the middle, be prepared to feel like you have people over you all the time. The space is soo narrow and the tables are soo close to the each other, that the whole experience is quite uncomfortable and unexpected for a place with this price point.

We had 2 waiters crash our table. Unintentionally, of course, it’s just too narrow for them to do their job while you can have a meal without...

We visited this restaurant after reading reviews on Tiktok on our mother/daughter break from Scotland. Having 2 coeliacs in our group we called ahead to ensure they were able to cater for us however there was a significant language barrier and our confidence in the information we were given came with much trepidation. Disappointingly we only had the option to sit outside and it was chilly. The food was lovely however it was apparent we were being avoided during the course of our meal so service was very slow. On paying the bill we had been given a wine almost twice the price of the one we ordered. Lastly on asking to call us a taxi we were advised,”we don’t do that” A very disappointing experience and not the experience we were expecting on our first night...